Music Educator Earns State Association Honor

December 16, 1992|By JONATHAN GOLDSTEIN Daily Press

WILLIAMSBURG — Armed with sheet music and ready to pound out a tune, a crowd of fifth-graders at Matthew Whaley Elementary School pull glockenspiels, metallophones, xylophones and drums from bins along the music room wall.

The children form into small groups, spread their instruments out on the floor and fill the room with dissonance. Half an hour later, music teacher Genrose Lashinger has forged the noise into a workable version of Pat-A-Pan, a traditional French Christmas carol.

Her ability to turn cacophony into symphony and the appreciation for music she instills in her pupils helped Lashinger win the Virginia Music Educators Association's Music Educator of the Year award last month.

"She has a way of involving lots of kids in music in one way or another," says Sandy Rogers, Matthew Whaley's principal. "The music program is very strong here because of what she has done."

Lashinger, a slight woman who is barely taller than her 10-year-old pupils, teaches music to 650 children per week. The 47-year-old James City County resident runs six school musicals each year, one for every grade in the school; sings soprano solos for the Bruton Parish choir, which she directed for 10 years; runs the school chorus program; and directs the Rainbow Connection, the school's traveling singing group.

She has also traveled to China, Indonesia and the Caribbean to learn about music and dance from other cultures. In those places she bought various instruments - with her own money - and brought them back to Williamsburg to help teach her students about different kinds of music.

"The most important thing to me is the children," she says. "I guess what I'm trying to do is create a good feeling about music in every child."

Applicants for the award, each of whom had to be nominated by another music teacher, had to gather letters of recommendation, including a letter from a current student.

Fifth-grader Jennifer Converse writes: "Mrs. Lashinger is a nice, helpful, caring person and a very good singer, but overall she's a great music teacher! If you don't understand something or you're singing a wrong note, she doesn't yell at you, she just tells you in a sweet and trusting voice you're doing something wrong."

Administrators, parents and other references for Lashinger had similarly glowing reports.

"Ms. Lashinger has a keen sense of awareness of the need for community involvement and support for music education," writes district Superintendent Gayden Carruth. "The benefits to the school division of ... Ms. Lashinger's talents are incalculable."

Lashinger also recently won a $300 grant from Virginia Commission of the Arts. She will use the money to buy supplies for a unit of study about China that will involve reading, music, dance, art and costumes.

The unit is designed to show the children how music is a major part of most cultures, a lesson she believes is essential in music education, Lashinger says.

"Music is an integral part of life," she says. "It's a real joy, and it's something children should start learning about early."